


Such Fragile Things

by I_prefer_the_term_antihero



Series: Tepes Family Cuteness [3]
Category: Castlevania (Cartoon), 悪魔城ドラキュラX 月下の夜想曲 | Castlevania: Symphony of the Night
Genre: Angst and Tragedy, Backstory, Childhood, Dracula Vlad Tepes | Mathias Cronqvist Is a Good Parent, During Canon, F/M, Family, Family Angst, Family Feels, Family Fluff, Father-Son Relationship, Fatherhood, Gen, I Made Myself Cry, Pre-Canon, S2 E7: For Love, Spoilers for the Netflix Show/Cartoon, Tepes Family, Tragedy, prepare to cry
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-03
Updated: 2020-09-22
Packaged: 2021-03-06 16:54:13
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,707
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26262226
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/I_prefer_the_term_antihero/pseuds/I_prefer_the_term_antihero
Summary: Dracula thought love was gentle, soft, and breakable...but what he  feels when holding his newborn son (ch1), and in his final moments (ch2), is anything but.
Relationships: Alucard & Dracula (Castlevania), Alucard | Adrian Tepes | Arikado Genya & Dracula Vlad Tepes | Mathias Cronqvist, Dracula Vlad Tepes | Mathias Cronqvist & Lisa, Dracula Vlad Tepes | Mathias Cronqvist/Lisa, Dracula/Lisa (Castlevania)
Series: Tepes Family Cuteness [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1908022
Comments: 28
Kudos: 70





	1. His Son's Life

Dracula did not read romance novels. He wasn’t really one for novels in general, especially written by humans. Science. Philosophy. Medicine. Not flights of fantasy. 

But the humans have a word for this…and it isn’t quite scientific. 

That word is ‘love.’ 

…But that can’t possibly cover it. 

But ‘love’ was always a silly little notion. Love was flowers and candy. Love was sappy letters and maudlin advances. ‘Love’ was sensitive and easy to break. ‘Love’ was soft. 

But this… this is anything but soft. 

This is a thing that does the breaking. It is painful, and sharp in the way it pierces him so thoroughly. It is tethered so tightly around his heart, that if he tried to sever its bonds his heart would burn, and quite possibly break. 

This is daggers and _I’d die for you_. This is a stake stabbed through the chest. 

And that is not what he knows of love. 

The the baby boy murmurs quiet nonsense beside his sleeping mother.

Vlad stands over the cradle—(a cradle his parents made out of metal, and cotton, and dedication)—the fabric soft against his fingers.

His mother. A human. Completely, and thoroughly. No turning necessary. He could have turned her…but that would have sullied the pink of her cheeks, the red of her lips, the blue of her eyes.

So many humans are out for blood without thirst involved. He needn’t corrupt one that didn’t experience such desires. 

Just an ordinary human, who was either brave or very stupid… or maybe a bit of both to walk straight into the demon’s castle. Maybe she was just curious. …He hoped it wouldn’t kill her one day, like the cat who meant well.

His mother. Lisa. With golden hair, and certain shimmer to her words too.

His father. Dracula. A vampire. _The_ vampire. The king of night and all its hordes. A scary story, full of blood and death and _the moon was full that night_.

—(Could he even be a father after all that killing? Was there a father behind all that bloodshed? Dare he even try to keep something alive, when these hands were constructed to kill?)—

And Adrian. Just born, already with one foot in each world. Half human. Half vampire. The stars dripped from the ceiling, and the sun spilled in through the window. 

Would they hurt him for it? 

Would this fact grant him safe passage into both worlds, or make him hated by both? Had he cursed this being to a life of not belonging? Or had he given him an opportunity no one else had; to belong to both?

Would being Dracula’s son make him a villain? Or would it make him a prince? Would the humans fear and hate him? Would the vampires bow to him?

Would being Lisa’s son make him a hero? Would the humans accept him as one of them? Would the vampires exile him as a half-breed, impure, no matter if his father had a castle, and a crown, and fangs all too ready to sink into their necks? 

Barely noticeable now, he has golden hair like his mother, and fangs like his father.

…He wonders how this creature, so full of light, could come from the king of night. 

Then Adrian starts crying. 

The king of night is uh…not equipped for this. He’s never comforted a crying child before. He’s made more than a few cry in his time, but he’s never been on the other end…it seems the much more difficult side of things. 

He has half—(okay, more than half)—a mind to wake Lisa for help. …But Lisa has done enough for today. Surely he can handle one crying baby. 

Vlad is careful not to let his nails pierce the child’s skin as he scoops him up, cradling him in his arms. 

Adrian is so small. It doesn’t feel like he’s made of thumping, pumping blood and bone. He feels as if he’s made of glass, and Dracula fears he’ll shatter in his hands. 

Dracula has killed so many things in his life. He has killed humans, and animals and, yes, another vampire or two. But he doesn’t want to kill this one. He is so desperate to keep him alive he thinks he might die himself before he saw anything touch him. 

Lisa stirs, and Vlad moves the child further away so as not to wake her. He sits in the chair in the corner of the room, by the basket full of toys he will soon play with, and the alphabet charts he will soon learn with. 

Dracula did not read romance novels. But he had once heard a lullaby, and he wonders if he can remember the lyrics. 

At the gentle song, slowly Adrian calms down in his father’s arms, and looks up at him with those golden eyes.

And Dracula wonders if the world was always this big. 

Vampire’s eyes are usually so cold and dark. But he is only half dark, and his eyes are full of sunlight.

He looks up at his father, this dark thing, the killer, the monster king. The creature they said could never learn to love. 

And Adrian smiles. 

When Dracula returns that smile, it is not an evil sneer tugging at his lips. It is like his face breaks, pouring out all the joy inside him. He leans forward and rests his forehead gently upon Adrian’s.

_“My boy.”_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> First of all, stay tuned, because I'm probably going to post another chapter of this!! (Fair warning, though, it's gonna be pretty different from this one tonally...though very much related, and feels-inducing!!)
> 
> Don't know if anyone will believe me, but this is actually the first Castlevania fic I ever wrote!! 
> 
> This was actually the precursor to ["If These Walls Could Talk"](https://archiveofourown.org/works/21162611/chapters/50369705)!! I was playing with how to start the scene, and I started describing that "Castlevania is not a good place to raise a child" thing that starts off If These Walls Could Talk. Then the way I was describing it started sounding like I was personifying the Castle, and then I was like WAIT THAT'S A BETTER IDEA XD So I kinda got more interested in that idea, haha! (By the way, if any of the lines from this fic are also in If These Walls Can Talk too, now you know why XD I didn't intend for there to be any repeats though.) 
> 
> Then a little while later I got a really nice prompt asking me to write a diary-style fic about Drac and Lisa recounting Adrian's birth, and I was thinking this ^^ fic and its images would work really well for it, so I didn't post it after that because I thought I'd reconfigure it for the diary thing.  
> I loved the prompt, but diary-style implies first person...and first person is really tough for fanfiction, and even more so a character like Dracula. It's weird, I love going into characters internal monologue, and I love first person (at least I do as far as my original writing goes), but in fanfiction when I try to write first person it feels almost like "I don't have a right to say I know directly what they're thinking"??...but it's weird, cuz I pretty much already do that...  
> Sorry, I'm rambling!  
> I really hope I can still write that diary fic at some point, but at the moment I'm still struggling, haha.
> 
> I've been wanting to get better at editing faster, and posting more often. Lately I've been going through my old/unfinished fics and trying to polish them up and post them, even if they're not perfect in my eyes. So I decided to go back to this one and finish it up anyways! If I do the diary one I guess I'll just have to use other images!


	2. His Father's Death

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _Please read!! I have a couple warnings for you before you read the fic!!_
> 
> 1\. I tagged both the cartoon/Netflix show and SOTN for the first chapter, because I feel the first chapter fits SOTN well, and fans of the game would enjoy it. HOWEVER if you're a SOTN fan who _wants_ to watch the show, and hasn't yet, (or someone who watches the show but hasn't gotten to this episode) go no further!!! This chapter has MAJOR spoilers for S2 E7: "For Love." 
> 
> 2\. Okay, I feel that this chapter needs some warning.  
> I am very _very_ happy that everyone enjoyed that first chapter (and thank you so SO much if you commented <3 <3 It was super encouraging!!).  
> However...if you are looking for more fluffy Tepes family adorableness...this chapter isn't that. 
> 
> I don't usually tag as I go, but a) ch1 could stand on its own when it was by itself, and b) the first and second chapters of this fic were so drastically different, I thought tagging for the second chapter early would freak people out, and/or confuse them so I just tagged for ch1 XD The tags and warnings, not to mention the summary itself, should now reflect both chapters.
> 
> I absolutely [do have more fluffy, cute Tepes family fics you could read](https://archiveofourown.org/series/1908022), as well as more lined up to finish/write and post, and I would also be happy to receive prompts for writing more of those kinds of fics if you want more!! ...This chapter specifically just isn't that. 
> 
> I hope this chapter is still good, and worth reading, (and of course I don't want you _not_ to read XD) and personally I like it a lot, and find it very powerful...but it was also pretty heart wrenching.
> 
> I am a big fan of mirroring in writing, and though I don't do a ton of fics in this format, it is one of my favorites to write in. So this chapter, rather than being a continuation of ch1, or another cute little story similar to it, is a mirror of it--aka the reverse.
> 
> As I said, I'd be happy to write more cute stuff similar to chapter 1, so if you're disappointed with the content here, hey, send me a cute Tepes family prompt (in the comments here, on in my ask box on tumblr) of what you were hoping ch2 was going to be and I can still write that!! 
> 
> All that being said, I do hope you're still interested in reading, and if you are, I'd love to hear what you thought in the comments!!

Dracula throws the golden man into wall, hard enough to break it, revealing the room on the other side.

Nails against the wood, against stone, footsteps merciless as a death toll, blood in the burning halls; Dracula is the monster from the stories after all.

He stalks into the room, his cloak furling behind him, seeking his prey. The kind of snarl only things not-quite-human-anymore make emanates from his throat. 

The moment he crosses the threshold, that snarl morphs into a gasp, and, as if it were some magic barrier…everything looks different. 

His cloak falls softly, quietly like a hand on his shoulder.

This dhampir, this man, up until now has been Alucard. The reverse of him. The thing meant to destroy him and stop his war. A hunter of vampires that is himself a vampire—(or half of one at least). No, not a _vampire_ hunter. Just Dracula’s hunter. All he has been is another thing in Dracula’s way. 

But this thing sitting against the bed, failing to catch his breath, golden hair falling about his face…looks different. 

_A little boy is gasping, leaning on his wooden sword just to stay up._

_“Father, do you think we can stop? I need a break.”_

_Vlad laughs, and the sound is warm. His hands fall to his sides and his smiles, stepping up to his son._

_“Of course, Adrian.” He puts his hand on his shoulder, ruffles his hair. “You’ve done well today._

He is…so small. 

This bed. A bookshelf. A wardrobe. A desk, with charts and maps. A basket of toys in the corner. All too small. Too dusty.

The window is letting too much light in. 

On the wall, a painting of a family. Too happy. 

…a boy, hurting, beneath the bed. 

Not a hunter, or an annoyance, or an enemy. Not a mindless, heartless, thing. Not an other. Not a _him_ or an _it_ to be disposed of, but a living, breathing, thinking, hurting _you._

A very specific _you_. A _you_ with a name. A _you_ with whom Dracula had shared so much of his life. A _you_ who perhaps knew Vlad more than anymore else. Not a _him_ or an _it_ to be destroyed, a _you_ that he needed so desperately to keep alive. 

Not Alucard; the thing meant to destroy him. 

Adrian. 

“It’s your room.”

His fingers, a moment ago poised to claw at this man, curl gently into a fist, hiding his nails. 

The rest of the castle was drenched in bloodshed. The rest of the castle was full of war. The rest of the castle had turned itself towards it’s master’s deeds, destroying itself in a pointless fight, just like him. 

But not this room. He had protected this room from all the blood. He dare not bring it with him. 

The heavens turn from hazardous red to delicate blue.

Both of them stare up into the stars. Not the real ones—though they are here to guide them too. The ones on the ceiling. The ones they played under, read under, the ones this golden man once dreamed under, the ones he used to learn their names and places in the sky when he was but a child. The rich blue like a spell, putting the warriors into a trance in the middle the battlefield. 

—(But this isn’t the battlefield, and that’s why the war must stop here)—

The blood is clearing from Vlad’s view. It has been a long time since he’s seen the world without the blood.

The room has been empty for a while, but the boy it belongs to is here now. 

And, in his proper place, all at once this golden man is that fragile thing again. That thing that could break if Vlad held him wrong. That thing Vlad, more than anything, wanted to keep alive, to protect, and who he would die for before he ever saw him get hurt.

Barely perceptible, Vlad is shaking. 

His hands are no longer claws against the walls. He sees them for what ugly, monstrous things they are. Ugly, monstrous, because of what they’ve been doing. He crosses them over his chest, as if to cage them; as if trying to keep them from hurting anything, ever, anymore. As if to feel his own heartbeat, and remind himself there is still something living there. 

This is the boy who he played cards, and chess, and swords with. This is the boy who asked about the myths in the stars, and the ones in our hearts. This is the boy who he bounced on his knee, and read to, and comforted when he cried, and on very special occasions sang to sleep. 

“ _My boy._ ”

Adrian is trying to stand, and for a moment his father sees a tiny thing on wobbly legs reaching for his open arms.

“I-I’m killing my boy.”

Dracula steps to the painting—(though he can barely feel his feet)—where an echo of his wife sits on canvas, holding that infant golden thing. 

He remembers her now. He wasn’t sure he did before. 

“Lisa…I’m killing our boy.” His voice is soft and cracked and breakable itself. “ _We_ painted this room. _We_ …made these toys…”

He was never one for sentiment, never grew attached to objects…but as he looks around at this room, and the things in it, those moments are flickering through his mind now—(is this what they mean when they say one’s life flashes before your eyes? Had he really forgotten so much? Had he really forgotten what life was?)—and the blood seems so obscene now. 

_Not in front of Adrian._

_“It’s our boy, Lisa.”_

With an exhale Alucard gets up, and it sounds like the world being crushed into a fine powder. The motion is not gentle…it comes with a cracking and all-too clear purpose, and now his steps are as calculated and foreboding as Dracula’s were moments ago. 

Vlad’s hands are now too dangerous to let sit at his sides, so he uses them to cover his eyes…to hide his pain from the world, to hide the world from his pain. A feeble defense against the pointed intention in his son’s own dangerous hands. Playing peekaboo one last time. 

“Your greatest gift to me. And I’m killing him.”

He hears Adrian’s breath very close to him, but it is not that of a beast ready to pounce, it is heavy, like the world is sitting on his chest. 

He takes his claws from his eyes to look into his son’s face.

_Vlad laughs, and the sound is cold._

_“You mean to stake me?”_

_“You want me to.”_

_“What?”_

_“You didn’t kill me before. You’re not going to kill me now. You want this to end as much as I do.”_

_“Do I?!”_

_“You died when my mother died. You know you did. This entire catastrophe has been nothing but history’s longest suicide note.”_

And if he could hurt this boy— _Adrian_ —who he loved more than anything, then:

“I must already be dead.”

Adrian’s eyes are not full of malice. He is not like anyone else that would try to kill the vampire king. Anyone else’s eyes would not be soft; they would be solid and still, pointed and gleaming with with hunger and hate. Anyone else wouldn’t hesitate, wouldn’t be gentle. 

Even now, Adrian’s eyes are still full of sunlight; trembling, rippling, ripping sunlight. 

It is not fear, nor anger that makes his eyes shudder. It is heartbreak. Imminent heartbreak. 

Because he wishes he could save him. Because he knows he cannot.

His heart has been aching for a very long time, slowly coming apart, and it is about to shatter. This golden man is about to split his own chest for the sake of saving the world.

Once upon a time all the stories they told him ended happily, and families stayed together, and no one ever died. His heart must fracture, for he knows their own cannot. 

How could Dracula ever try to take that sunlight from the world, when Lisa had brought it down to him from her place in the sky? He’d traveled the world in search of the sun...but his sunlight was right here…and if he couldn’t see that then…

He closes his eyes. He opens them. A silent ask. A silent answer. They both know.

Alucard steps closer. And it is not to hold him tight—(no matter how much he they both wish he could just wrap his arms around him and cry, like long ago, and understand that after the rain everything would be better).

Now Dracula is the fragile thing. And they both know what he must do. 

He is trying to be gentle. For love is the only thing that can be harsh in the kindest word, and gentle in the cruelest stroke.

That horrible cracking, crackling, squelching sound. Red drips from his chest along the golden man’s sleeve.

It isn’t death, really. It is mercy. Mercy on humanity. Mercy on Vlad himself. Death had already administered its kiss when Lisa died. And in his undead state Dracula had tried to spread that death to everything and everywhere else, in the world’s most exorbitant suicide note. 

“Son.” The word is soft, rasping; the wind in a hollow house. 

“Father.” The word is a broken plea; the sun on the abandoned floorboards and dolls, wishing it could illuminate the family that once lived there instead—

And this hurts, yes, but even so, it is the love behind it that is more piercing than any stake. 

Love has never been breakable. Love is what does the breaking. 

There is something defiant in Alucard’s eyes as he drives it in farther. 

His heartbeat fills the room. 

And, after much bending, the stake bores through, and the mirror breaks. 

—(And for a moment Adrian could have sworn the sound came from his chest)—

Dracula does not burst into flame. Death, for him, is not an explosive show. It is soft whispers: he turns slowly to ashes, without any burn. 

Vlad wants to wrap his arms around this small, precious, golden thing one last time. To say goodbye.

Adrian never looked at his father like a monster before, never backed away from his touch, but Dracula could swear the fear in his eyes now—(a little boy hiding from the thunder)—is the only reason the breath is leaving his chest.

Adrian is so, so tiny. (And after everything, he cannot bring himself to deliver the last stroke.)

Dracula’s last thought, the sonnet of a dying monster, is not a curse, or a threat, but something very gentle indeed.

_Lisa, Adrian…I’m so sorry._

The only thing left of him is a wedding ring.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> After watching this episode, this scene shocked and absolutely destroyed me, in the best possible way. It could quite possibly be one of my favorite scenes in anything I've watched ever.  
> When I heard him say "my boy" in it, (first of all, of course it ripped my heart right out of my chest), I wondered if that was how he thought of or talked to him in the past. It made me think of Adrian's birth, and that's how this fic was born, way back when I originally watched this episode. And it's why I went to this scene with ch2.
> 
> At the time I didn't know just how much this scene destroyed everyone else too...to the point where I don't see the fandom talking about it. So I don't know if everyone will hate me for writing about it XD But I really hope I did the scene at least some amount of justice. 
> 
> If you happen to like this mirror format, my Kylo Ren fic [The Only Fight"](https://archiveofourown.org/works/21747610/chapters/51883591) is currently my other fic written this way. ["Dismembered Duets"](https://archiveofourown.org/works/26244271/chapters/63880000) (Pandora Hearts Lacie & Oswald) is also supposed to be this, as is ["Before It Kills You Too"](https://archiveofourown.org/works/24135781/chapters/58112539) (Lore Olympus Hera and Zeus), and ["The Empty Throne"](https://archiveofourown.org/works/26040589/chapters/63325633) (FMAB Ed and Hohenheim) will have elements of it, but all only have one chapter posted at the moment XD "The Only Fight" is by far the strongest version of it. 
> 
> By the way, due to ["If These Walls Could Talk"](https://archiveofourown.org/works/21162611/chapters/50369705) being born from this fic, you may see some similarities between this chapter, and when I finally get to this scene in it. And, knowing those similarities existed was part of why I didn't post this fic first. But I decided that, though some of the images are shared, most of the ones here are unique to Dracula's perspective, and that it was still worth posting on its own. (Plus, knowing my pace, that's probably gonna be a while, and I doubt people will remember the images I used here anyways XD).


End file.
